Robert Bosnak, renowned Jungian analyst and author, pioneered this innovative method called Embodied Imagination ® (EI) in the late 70s. He has 40 years of clinical experience working with dreams. Past president of the International Association of the Study of Dreams, he has taught worldwide and EI is now being practised in medicine, psychotherapy, theatre, fiction writing, art, business and technology.

Why – and in what ways –do dreams have the power to heal or transform us? Robert Bosnak, explores this question and illustrates this in many absorbing case studies in his books. A Little Course in Dreams, Tracks in the Wilderness of Dreaming, Embodiment: Creative Imagination in Medicine, Art and Travel.

Dreams and Memories

People in all cultures while dreaming, experience being in a place where something happens. Everything in the environment is embodied. In a dream the imagination presents itself as embodied. The method of embodied imagination helps to get back to the dream experience before our waking consciousness makes particular cultural interpretations.
Embodied Imagination ® uses slow motion sensate attention to explore the image environment of a dream, or daytime memory in this way it becomes vivid again. Through exploring the image presences, we find they have their own internal intelligence.

Dreams and Healing

Embodied Imagination® can be effectively used with physical pain and illness through working with symptoms and applying the craft of modern dream incubation to reach realms of intelligence far removed from habitual consciousness.

Since the beginnings of Western medicine, healing sanctuaries have used dream incubation to facilitate encounters with creative sources of healing. Robert Bosnak is a co-founder of the Santa Barbara Healing Sanctuary, a revival of a dream-based treatment, when dreamers would come to an Asclepian sanctuary to incubate healing dreams. It is designed to accelerate and deepen the healing process by way of integrative therapies while focusing on the resilient creative power of dreaming.

Research studies have shown that EI helps to reduce the experience of pain and significantly benefits cancer patients.

EI and Creativity

By way of incubation, the embodied intelligence of images can reach deeply into the creative processes with remarkable results.

Embodied Imagination® has been used with actors, painters, writers and those interested in creative expression. The forces of creative imagination reawakened the creative flow and enabled the completion of Penny Busetto’s award-winning novel, The Story of Anna P as Told by Herself, after many months of writers block.

Robert Bosnak worked for some seasons with the Bell Shakespeare Company and the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford to develop EI for the rehearsal room.

Programs

Study the cutting edge in working with dreams, memories and health issues. This 3 year training program, offered by the International Society for Embodied Imagination®, Australian training, leads to certification as an Embodiment Practitioner™.
Join the only comprehensive and in-depth training in working with dreams available in Australia.

About Us

Embodied Imagination® is a therapeutic and creative way of working with dreams, memories, physical symptoms of illness and creative ideas. Pioneered in the late 1970’s by Robert Bosnak (1948 - ), a Dutch Jungian analyst, Embodied Imagination® has developed over thirty years of practice, writing and teaching. It is practiced individually and in groups, in 7 countries of the world. In 2006 the International Society for Embodied Imagination® was formed.